Chapter Four The Great Unraveling

Chapter Four The Great Unraveling

Elloren Guryev

Eastern Realm

I’m half-conscious and lost in darkness. My rootlines seize, grasping for a Forest connection, my bond to the Dyoi Forest

obliterated.

Yvan’s mouth comes down on mine, sweeping me into a kiss, the heat of it blazing a spiral of Wyvern-strong fire through my

body. I arch into him and grab desperate hold of one of his horns to pull his mouth harder against mine, my bonded connection

to his fire drawing me into a stronger link to his kindred Zhilaan Forest.

His warrior fire Forest.

A Forest I can sense fighting against the Natural Matrix’s complete undoing with a ferocity I did not imagine could come from

trees, its violet fire aura radiating out toward the newly untethered root systems of Erthia with single-minded grit.

Consciousness floods back in a rush, deep violet light bursting through my vision as a line of the Zhilaan Forest’s fire power

sears through my withered rootlines.

Dryad Witch , the Forest rumbles, like a roll of thunder.

My vision returns, the purple blaze fading, and I break our kiss, breathing hard as I meet Yvan’s violet-hot gaze.

“Elloren,” he breathes, his expression wild with concern, his fire lashing through our bond. Soleiya is crouched beside Yvan,

her gold-blazing eyes fixed on me.

I glance frantically around, desperate to locate my friends and loved ones amidst the tight crowd of allies.

We’re in a large cavern. Its purple-veined black stone is lit sapphire by a suspended Noi rune. Outside the narrow mouth of our cavern, the skies are churning gray, wind blasting so violently that visibility is reduced to an arm’s length. Vang Troi stands sentry beside the opening, along with Diana and Freyja Zyrr.

“Where are we?” I ask Yvan and Soleiya.

“Near the top of the Voloi Mountain Range,” Yvan answers, cradling me.

“Is anything left of our shielding over the East?” I press, forcing myself into a sitting position, Yvan’s embrace helping

me upright.

He shakes his head, frustration burning in his eyes. “The Vu Trin storm band absorbed it. The East is unshielded.”

“Ancient One,” I gasp. “Vogel can invade at any moment.”

A deeper fright grips hold. I look to my Dryad’kin, many of them slumped down, like Gwynn and Mavrik, their backs against

the cavern’s walls, their Forest-fueled power dangerously depleted, so many kindreds murdered once again. A half-conscious

Lucretia is cradled in Jules’s arms, his silver falcon perched on his shoulder, wings worriedly flapping. Sylvan is doubled

over, bracing himself against the dark stone, his skin grayed, his pine branch hair dropping needles. Iris is holding on to

him, a desperate golden fire flickering in her eyes.

Yulan is weeping uncontrollably, her flower tresses morphed to dead, shriveled vines, the deep green of her skin rapidly fading

to ash gray. Her unconscious heron kindred lies crumpled at her side. Ariel is on her knees beside the bird, expression dire,

her hands pressed to the heron’s breast.

Oaklyyn appears to be in shock. She’s on her knees, her green eyes wide as she stares into nothing, murmuring, “My kindred

ones, my kindred ones,” over and over. Raz’zor is crouched in human form beside her, his fire aura blazing around and through

her withering rootlines with desperate, impassioned heat. A slumped, semiconscious Thierren rasps “Sparrow” over and over

through grayed lips, and Alder is weeping next to the motionless form of one of her giant eagles, the rest of her battered

flock gathered around her green, purple-branch-marked form, her bonded Vo Forest clearly still hanging on. But for how long?

I turn, and another jolt of fear spears through me as I spot Vothe cradling Trystan’s limp form. Aislinn, Diana, Andras, Jarod,

and Vothe’s great-aunt Sithendrile are grouped around them, Trystan’s half-lidded eyes blearily meeting mine.

“He’s all right,” Vothe calls to me, clearly reading the desperation flaring through my fireline, the Zonor blue stripped

from the tips of his hair and his power. “Our bond is keeping his rootlines from completely withering,” Vothe gravely states,

and when I look further on, a limp Fain seems to be similarly anchored by Sholin.

I turn back to Yvan and Soleiya, my tenuous connection to the Zhilaan through Yvan holding my rootlines together, its faint purple branching patterns emblazoned on my grayed skin. “Did we lose anyone to the storms?” I frantically ask them.

“No,” Yvan assures me. “Mavrik and Gwynn used the last of their power to pull everyone through the Void storms by creating

a loose tether to the shield-linkage runes Oaklyyn marked on us. But the tethers they created... their twinned binding

power is so strong, if any of us tries to leave the group, we’ll be yanked back. We’re trapped here together until the binding

fades.”

I gape at him, the ramifications staggering.

“The storms outside,” Soleiya adds, her tone laced with dread as she glances toward the whipping maelstrom just past our cavern’s

mouth, “they’re stronger than the strongest of cyclones.”

The three of us exchange a blazingly dire look, the unspoken raging between us—what’s just swept in outside is merely the

opening salvo of a nightmare of environmental undoing, the Magedom’s Shadow about to infiltrate the chaos and poison everything .

“We’ve got to get to the Sublands!” Sage is raging to Ra’Ven near the cavern’s mouth, her violet hair whipped about by the

wind. Ra’Ven is keeping tight hold of her, as if he’s preventing her from hurling herself straight into the storms outside,

her purple eyes full of a wild urgency. The Wyvernfire blazing through Sage’s fireline, gained when she was pregnant with

their Icaral child, is keeping her somewhat magically moored, even as her shriveling rootlines flail about for purchase.

“We have to get to Fyn’ir and Fern and my sisters,” she snarls at Ra’Ven as she struggles to pull her arms from his grip.

“They’re in the Sublands,” Ra’Ven adamantly reassures her. “With Fyon and Mora. Likely a damned sight safer there than here—”

“Nowhere is safe!” Oaklyyn cries as she desperately pulls on Raz’zor’s fire.

“We’ve got to get out of here!” Ariel hisses from where she’s crouched by Yulan’s heron, more fear in her expression than

I’ve ever witnessed. “We can’t let Vogel advance any farther ! He’ll gain enough power to blast through the Sublands and come for Wynter !”

“Valasca is there, as well!” Ni Vin lashes out at everyone, the level of emotion in the young sorceress’s voice a hard blow

to my gut as Freyja paces nearby, Freyja’s concern for her people writ deep in her hazel tattooed features, an agonized sorrow

in her eyes, her kindred bear likely destroyed, like so many other kindreds...

“My people have talented sorceresses amongst them,” Freyja tells us, voice rough. “They’ll likely be able to shield my Amaz’kin and their allies from the storm, but we all know that Shadow terror is about to strike the East because the Realm has left itself wide open to attack.”

My attention pivots to my tenuous link to the Zhilaan, a slim line of its power simmering battle-fire hot through my unmoored

lines.

The idea hits, like a bolt of light.

“We need to connect everyone to the Zhilaan Forest,” I say to Yvan in a rush of resolve, desperate for a way forward. “The

Zhilaan wants to make a stand against this, I can feel it.”

Sylvan spits out a devastated sound, his limp body braced against both Iris and the cavern’s wall as he sets his gaze on me.

“You don’t understand.” He swipes his free hand out at all of us, tears sheening his eyes. “None of you do. You don’t get

an infinite number of chances to destroy the Natural World and rebound from it. It’s over .”

His words are a harsher assault than the pummeling storms outside as he slashes his hand toward the cavern’s storming mouth.

“What you see there?” he levels. “That’s the beginning of the end .”

A deeper alarm ignites as I turn to Wrenfir. “Were Hazel and my ravens pulled into a Reckoning?” I shakily ask, able to feel

the trace of Darkness still connecting me to them.

“They’re trying to hold off the Reckoning,” Wrenfir chokes out. “They’ve sacrificed themselves for our cruel stupidity and

dissolved themselves into Nature.” He says this with devastating finality, his power a heart-shattering mess. He’s slumped

on the cavern’s floor, his fists knotted in his dark hair. He lifts his spider-marked gaze, his cheeks streaked with tears,

his eyes pierced through with violent grief. “Hazel didn’t want to leave me,” he gruffly forces out. “I could sense his emotions

through our mating bond. But he had no choice. He pulled himself into Nature’s Death energy to try and keep it from sliding

into a Reckoning. But he won’t be able to hold off the release of that Reckoning forever.”

An ominous quiet descends, save for the violent winds battering the mountaintop around us, grief swelling in my heart for

both Hazel and Wrenfir and for my Errilor Ravens, kindreds I barely had a chance to get to know and love.

And Tierney’s Death Fae and the other Deathkin who were here in Noilaan—did they dissolve themselves into the Natural World

as well to hold off the Reckoning as I sensed? And what of the refugees trapped past the border wall? Will any of them survive

the raging storms?

Aislinn lets out a shivering breath, tears pooling in her eyes, Jarod’s arm wrapped tight around her shoulder. “I never imagined it would all end like this,” she rasps.

“It’s not the end yet,” I snarl back, rebellion rising as I battle back the despair attempting to tear a hole through my heart.

“There are still trees ,” I insist. “It’s not over while there is still living Forest .”

Sylvan huffs out a harsh sound. “It’s not enough, Elloren,” he says. “A few scattered Forests are not enough to hold a shattered

Matrix together.”

“Maybe not,” Yvan harshly returns, “but the Zhilaan Forest wants to keep fighting. I can feel it though our kindred bond.

And I plan on fighting to the end, as well.”

“How?” Sylvan demands. His stark challenge sizzles in the air, and we’re all powerless against it, the nightmare bearing down.

“We go forward on faith,” Gwynn shakily suggests, her green hue also faded to a sickly gray, but a trace of prismatic light

still burning at the edges of her golden eyes. “It’s all we have left.”

“Faith in what ?” Wrenfir bites back.

Gwynn levels her golden stare on him. “In the Verdyllion,” she insists. “It’s still out there. And, maybe... in the power

that’s at the center of all of Erthia’s faiths. We’ve seen the Watchers inside the trees...”

“You honestly think religion can save us?” Wrenfir furiously spits out.

Gwynn shakes her head, her jaw set in a defiant line. “I don’t know. But, maybe all the faiths taken together... maybe

they could point a way forward. For however long we have left in this fight.”

“We have to keep fighting with everything in us,” Andras snarls, urgency in his gaze. “I don’t have the luxury of giving up! I have

a child !”

“As do I!” Alcippe growls, a large amethyst gripped in her fist.

Andras’s and Alcippe’s outbursts strike deep, a remembrance of Valasca’s words like a bell rung straight through my heart—

You will lose every last thing that’s important to you.

But you’ll lose those things so that others won’t have to.

I realize in one, great swoop that Andras and Valasca are right. We have to keep fighting for a future for all the surviving

children, everywhere. And for every last surviving tree.

“Gwynn might be on to something,” I say on impulse, grasping for a path forward. “There might be something in all the faiths that can show us how to fight back. They all have the Watchers. And the Verdyllion, in one form or another—”

“And the Source Tree,” Gwynn adds.

“And the Reaping Times,” Wrenfir growls. “And five million other stories detailing Erthia’s razing followed by the ascendancy of the ‘One True Faith’!”

“You’re right,” I agree, “but, it’s like Gwynn said... we’ve all seen the Watchers. And everyone who has been a Bearer of the Verdyllion Wand... we’ve all seen them outside of the trees.” I force myself slightly up, the rebellion inside me gaining ground. “Even though the Magedom tries to pin

the Watchers down on their flags and banners and clothing, and now the Noi are hell-bent on doing the same... they can’t be pinned down. That’s the faith Gwynn is talking about. Faith in them . And how they led us to each other. And maybe they’ll lead us toward a way to fight back .”

I look to Yvan, my love for him searing through our bond.

“I can go forward on that type of faith,” Yvan offers with the force of a vow, his arms and wings wrapped around me, his unextinguishable

love blazing through our bond. “I love you, Elloren,” he passionately states, the level of feeling in his tone bringing tears

to my eyes. “And even if Erthia is coming undone, I’ll fight for you until my last breath.” He sets his gaze on his mother,

violet fire burning bright in his eyes. “And for you, Mav’ya.” He glances around. “For all of you.”

“I can go forward on love,” Oaklyyn seconds as the violent storms blur the world outside, her gaze locking on Raz’zor’s crimson-fire

eyes. “I’ve fallen in love with you, Raz’zor the Unbroken.” She glances toward the storms, tears misting her graying eyes

as she chokes out a sob. “There’s no sense in not saying it now, with so little time left. I’ve known you for such a short

time... but your love... it hit me like a bolt of red lightning.” Lips trembling, she shrugs. “Even though it goes against

everything I ever thought I’d feel for anyone. I love you. And I’ll fight with you till the end.”

Raz’zor’s fire rears. His pale wings flick dramatically out to arc around her, his eyes taking on such a fiery glow that their

heat cuts straight through the storm’s chill. “Be my mate, Magnificent Tree One,” he hisses, his flame shot through with such

a ferocious level of feeling, I can feel it blazing through our horde bond as he holds one pale, clawed hand out to her.

Emotion surging through the last traces of her power, Oaklyyn takes his hand and, in a blur, Raz’zor pulls her into a kiss,

the edges of his fire blasting through our entire horde, Yvan and I both shuddering against the back-blow of vermillion flame.

Oaklyyn lets out an ecstatic cry against Raz’zor’s mouth, looking dazed when they finally break their kiss, his vermillion

fire now burning in her eyes. And then, for the first time since I’ve been hurled into Oaklyyn’s orbit, she smiles at Raz’zor,

wide and beaming, in beautiful defiance of the end of the world. Raz’zor grins back at her, teeth gleaming as his invisible

fire whips around her with wild, protective abandon.

“It’s true that the odds stacked against us are impossible,” I say to everyone. “Erthia may truly be coming to an end. So,

how do we want our last chapter to be written?”

“Together,” Soleiya answers, her voice and fire full of fierce love. “Not apart.”

“Forever unbroken!” Naga hisses.

“Vo’s priest, Wyn Juun... he taught me a Vo’lon saying,” Trystan rasps out in a battered voice. “ ? ‘Way Will Open.’ It means... to trust that if you go forward in love and faith, a path will open. Even when all hope is lost.” He looks to the storms. “ Especially then.”

“This is all so easy for you,” Wrenfir snarls, his infuriated voice shattering clear through our tenuous grasp on hope. “To

delude yourself with all these fantasy stories . To hell with the Watchers. The love of my life has been ripped away from me ! Because the world is ending ! It’s over ! There is no hope! And I’ll never see Hazel again! Unless he’s forced by the Reckoning to come back and kill me. To kill us all ! And soon after, there will be only one power at play in the world! The Shadow . Your love,” he sneers at all of us, his lips twisting with combative devastation, “it comes too late ! The Shadow has WON —”

A roar cuts through my uncle’s words, a blast of white lightning detonating outside as two winged figures soar into the cavern,

everyone freezing...

... as Vothe’s father, Hizar’drile, and his brother, Gethindrile, land inside the cavern’s mouth.

“We believe you!” Hizar’drile cries out, his eyes flashing lightning as they find Vothendrile’s, a devastated expression slashed

across his face. “We’re here to align with you!”

A beat of wordless shock rips through the room before Vothe’s aura of power catapults into an explosion of storm-hurling rage.

With a snarl Vothe launches himself at his father and brother, fast as a blur, just as Rafe and Raz’zor surge toward Vothe

and grab restraining hold of him, Vothe’s lightning power rearing so hard, visible threads crackle out to bolt toward his

kin.

“You believe us now ?” Vothe cries. “Now that everything is destroyed ? Now that the entire Natural Matrix of Erthia is obliterated ?” He tears himself from Rafe’s and Raz’zor’s restraining grips, facing his father and brother down, his power blasting toward

them with spitting fury. “Do you have any idea what you’ve DONE ?”

Hizar’drile’s onyx face is a mask of devastation. “You were right, my son. Everything you warned us of—”

“If you had simply listened to the trees ,” Vothe rages, “ none of this would have happened!”

“There is no putting the Forest back together again!” Sylvan levels as he forces himself up and takes a staggering step toward

Hizar’drile, his fists balled. “The Dyoi Forest was old growth Forest ! That Matrix took thousands of years to form!”

“Wait,” I interject, realizing, in a flash, that a large swath of the sky outside the cavern is visible, the violent storm

pushed away. I look to Hizar’drile. “How did you push back the weather? And how did you find us?”

Hizar’drile blinks at me. “A large portion of our Wyvern Vu Trin force and half of the remaining Vu Trin forces are outside,”

he answers, “holding the unmoored weather around this mountaintop at bay. Commander Ung Li is with them. We tracked you here

via the rune she marked you with. We’ve all broken with Noilaan. And we’re aligning with you. We’ll listen to your trees.

We’ll do more than listen. We’ll fight with you for Erthia.”

I exchange a shocked look with Yvan, our rebellion gaining ground. Yvan rises, his gaze burning into Hizar’drile. “Do you

have enough power to fly us all through the violent weather and get us to the nearest military portal to Zhilaan?”

“We do,” he affirms.

Our rebellion digs in deeper, a rush of battle-fire flowing into Yvan and me from the Zhilaan Forest as the depleted power

of everyone surrounding me is flooded by a renewed desire to rise and fight.

“Looks like the story is not yet over,” Ariel says as she and Bleddyn toss me sly looks, Ariel’s wings snapping out along

with her small raven’s, Bleddyn’s grip tightening around the malachite stylus in her hand.

I turn my gaze back to Hizar’drile as the distant Zhilaan Forest’s warrior energy rises inside Yvan and me, my words shot

through with Dryad resolve when they come. “Get us to the Zhilaan Forest.”